WHAT’S NEW AS OF JANUARY 2012?

Note from the Editor

This month, I took time out to reflect on 2011’s Policyland roller coaster, to celebrate the novel advancements and lament the setbacks. Let’s start with the good news (and luckily, there were plenty of candidates). I found the following regulatory snapshots to be particularly ground-breaking:

1) Hawaii Interconnection

On November 29, 2011, the Hawaii Public Utilities Commission issued an order that significantly improved Hawaii’s interconnection procedures, known as Rule 14H. In addition to other improvements, a unique supplemental review process was incorporated into Rule 14H to allow a generator to avoid more intensive study if the “aggregate capacity per Line Section is below 50% of the Line Section minimum kW load during the period when the proposed generation is available.” Then, in December, the Hawaii PUC issued another favorable decision that broke further ground in several burgeoning interconnection issues.

Why this matters: Hawaii has proven its place among the leaders of clean energy policy in the country. This shift away from a hard 15% (of line section peak load) interconnection screen, in favor of a more flexible 50% of minimum load screen has already begun to pique the interest of other states that are experiencing high solar adoption rates. In other words, this development can allow more solar to safely connect to the grid, in more places.

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While customer-sited net metering and interconnection policies are primarily addressed at the state level, they are also becoming important on a regional basis. This newsletter has been designed to provide state-level policy updates and capture emerging regional trends.Connecting to the Grid is a free, electronic newsletter published each month by the Interstate Renewable Energy Council, Inc. (IREC). Click here to subscribe.